The Mutt Rebellion
by SaoFireAngel
Summary: What if the tribute-mutts from the first book really were the dead tributes? While Katniss leads the Mockingjay Rebellion in the streets, Clove and the others bring it to the mutt labs. Features Clato and one slight hint of Clarvel.


_**Author's Note: I found this story from a few years ago on my laptop, and figured I'd post it. After reading Mockingjay, I found myself wondering what happened to the labs where the mutts were made, since it wasn't mentioned. This randomness was the result of my wondering. :) Hope you enjoy.  
I know there's a lot of argument over what Foxface's real name is, but since it's not said in the books, I always thought of her as Sierra. Don't know why, to me it just suits her. :)**_

* * *

My mind is still haunted by the images of the last night of the Hunger Games. Katniss Everdeen was right when she said that the mutts were the dead tributes. After we died they put our eyes and our brains and god-knows what else into these horrible mutt bodies. My life, my existence as a living, breathing creature, should have been over when Thresh hit me with that rock. Instead I'm a muttation, held in a small cell in the lab in the mountains that surround the Capitol. And I'm constantly haunted by what we did.

I'll never shake these memories of helping to rip Cato apart. He was my district partner, he was my friend, and in the end, he was so much more. We were together, might even have won together if Thresh hadn't stepped in when I fought Katniss. It was the night of the rule change when we got together. We had been trying hard to stay friends and to keep even that at a distance, because we would have to kill each other, but the announcement that night changed everything. We could both have lived. We should both have lived, or we should both have died. Instead I ended up here, and in those first three days of my life as a mutt the Gamemakers were able to control everything I did, every move. I knew what I was doing, but I had no control over my body.

I do now, though, and they can't force me to live like this. I won't eat. I can still claim this small victory. I can die in my own way, here in my cell, and unless they force feed me - and I intend to rip a few hands off before I give in to that - there's nothing they can do. I guess they could drug me and put me on an IV drip, or something, but I'd just go right back to starving myself when I got off it. I don't want to live like this, and I couldn't eat even if I wanted to. The truth is I loved Cato, and those memories of his death - partly at my teeth and claws - are constant fuel for the fire of agony that's burning my heart away.

The other tributes - at least most of them - are here, but they didn't turn Cato into a mutt. I think they would have, but they couldn't salvage his brain. That's what I heard one of them saying. Katniss' arrow did too much damage and they couldn't make a mutt out of him. They had trouble making me thanks to the damage the rock did to my brain, but they were able to fix that. I only lost some basic memory. Cato's brain was too badly and too deeply damaged. That's one small mercy. I miss him, and I wish I could see him again, but I love him enough to be glad he doesn't have to face this life. I don't know if souls exist, but if they do then at least his is free. I love him enough to be grateful for that.

I don't know how long we've been here now. I know there's revolution outside. Rebellion, with Katniss Everdeen as a symbol of it, the Mockingjay. Maybe that's why we're still alive, to help in that. I heard a scientist say something about our families, and how they'd get a nasty shock if they rebelled. Most of the tributes from the Seventy-Fourth Games are here. Glimmer's mutt died when Katniss shot her and I don't think they bothered making another. There were four others who died, one killed by Katniss, one by Peeta and two by Cato. The rest of us are still here. Thresh was wounded by Katniss' arrow but they fixed him up. None of us want to be here. Most of us are quiet. The girl who, in her human life, came from District Five and was named Sierra has the cell next to mine and I sometimes hear her snuffling around it, trying to find a way out. The cells have glass walls, so I sometimes watch her. Further down, little Rue howls sometimes.

Marvel is across the corridor from me. _'Come on, Clove, you might as well eat something.'_ he whines in my head now. Yeah, we're telepathic. Don't ask me why. Probably a side effect, 'cause I doubt the scientists would want us to communicate.

I leap to my feet and turn on him, lunging towards the glass wall and snarling. Damn it, how long is this body going to stay strong? Marvel skitters backwards even though there are two one-foot-thick panes of glass and a corridor separating us.

' _You want to live like this, Marvel? For god-knows how long?'_ I growl back silently. _'I don't!'_

I turn away from him and go to lie down again.

' _There's no point starving.'_ he replies. _'It's not the way I want to go.'_

' _Better that than life as a mutt.'_ I snarl back at him without turning.

Sierra has been glancing between us. She really does look like a fox now. I think she's going to say something, and I'm about to snarl at her to shut up when the door opens down the hall. Snarls echo off the glass walls as a pair of scientists come down the corridor. I hear Thresh launch himself at the glass as usual, with the usual lack of effect. He's going to hurt himself one of these times. Rue whines softly. Sierra and Marvel both growl. I can't even be bothered to look up. Whenever the scientists come in I remember those early days, remember them controlling me and then, of course…

They stand outside my cell. "She's still not eating."

"How long will it take her body to start to weaken?"

"To weaken drastically and life-threateningly, about three weeks. But without food she won't have full fighting capacity after another five days."

"Crane's gonna kill us if we lose another one. He's angry enough about the ones that died in the arena."

They're angry? Good. Oh, yeah, and "Crane" is Seneca Crane, former Head Gamemaker. I know the rumours that were spread out in the real world, that he'd been executed for allowing Katniss and Peeta to live, but that was just to scare the other Gamemakers into behaving. Truth is, rumours of Seneca Crane's demise have been greatly exaggerated. He's in charge of the mutt labs now. Too clever a mind for the Capitol to lose, I guess.

"We gonna have to start force-feeding her?"

' _Bring it on. I'll enjoy the taste of your blood.'_

"If she doesn't start eating soon we'll drug her and stick her on a drip feed. Keep her that way 'til we need her."

They walk away, talking now about the rebellion and how they plan to use us, but I'm barely listening. Why did District Two ever glorify any of this? Did our forefathers really think it was the only way to survive? Sure, we found it easier to live with the Games, we didn't waste our lives ranting about or fearing them, but most of District Two has lost its humanity just as surely as I have now. I guess maybe I'd already lost my humanity long before this. Didn't I glorify the killing just like the rest of Two? Didn't I share their fierce loyalty to the Capitol? That probably means my humanity was long gone. I like to think I found it again in those last few days with Cato.

* * *

Every day they take us out into a huge yard with obstacle courses and whatnot. We're left mostly to our own devices, with four guards armed with tranquiliser guns to watch us. If we don't do anything we get a zap with a tazer, but we can do whatever obstacles we want or just run around. I do the obstacle courses most days, hoping to keep my mind off Cato and weaken my body faster.

Today Sierra suddenly appears at my side. _'Run with me, Clove.'_

' _Bite me, Five!'_ I snarl back. I'm not going to start socialising as if we were all still human.

Sierra doesn't leave my side so I snap at her. She just leaps nimbly to the side, out of the way, and then swerves closer again. _'Just follow me.'_

What is this girl's problem? I give up arguing and follow her along one route of the obstacle course. We dive under a few swinging beams and leap over a pool of deep water, and then we swerve into a tunnel and we're out of sight of the guards. Sierra skids to a stop, and if I didn't have good reflexes, I'd crash into her. At the mouth of the tunnel, she lifts a paw and points towards the fence. I stare at it, wondering what she's seeing.

' _What?'_ Well, at least it's interrupted the monotony of the days.

' _There's a weakness in the chain link. The electricity doesn't flow through there, and it would be easy to get our teeth into it and rip it out.'_

I frown - we still kind of have eyebrows - and my eyes finally see what she means. I can spot the weaker chains, where the metal is damaged and the power can't flow. I look at her, surprised, and she shrugs. There's smugness radiating from beneath her cool manner.

' _District Five, remember? Power.'_

' _So, what? There's a weakness. What are we supposed to do with that?'_

' _Use it. Break out.'_

Break out. And then we could destroy this place. I'm beyond all thoughts of escaping myself. I do not want to live like this. But I will gladly go down in a blaze of glory if it'll destroy this place and help in the rebellion against the Capitol. Because any respect I had for them vanished when they forced me to tear Cato apart.

' _They're going to get suspicious soon. We'd better get moving.'_

Before I can speak Sierra is dashing out of the tube. I launch myself after her, emerging just as a guard approaches. I snarl at him instinctively and he backs off, waving his gun at me warningly.

A claxon sounds and we all stop. This sound means training's over for the day, but we'll be back out here together tomorrow. I catch Sierra's eye and nod as we're herded back to our cells. The idea of an escape gives me a reason to keep going for a while. To destroy this place, I need to be at full strength, so I wolf down the food they give me. The scientists murmur appreciatively when they come in to check on me. They think they've won. Let them. They'll know better when my teeth rip into their throats.

* * *

The next day I know that Sierra has been talking to everyone about the plan. We all gather in the centre of the yard, moving around just enough that we don't arouse suspicion.

' _So we're all agreed then?'_ Sierra asks. _'We're gonna break out?'_

' _How?'_ asks the boy from Ten. _'The guards watch us every minute.'_

' _No, they don't.'_ Rue pipes up. We all look at her. _'They all turn away from us for two and a half minutes every day, when the coffee comes.'_

Damn, that kid's observant. No wonder Katniss wanted her for an ally.

She continues, _'When they're backs are turned half of us could take them down and the other half could get to work on the fence so we could get out.'_

' _But we don't know where we're going.'_ Marvel points out. _'We don't know where the way OUT out is.'_

' _I'm not looking for the way OUT out.'_ I admit. _'I plan to find the main control room of this place and blow it up. I don't want to live life as one of their creations.'_

The others exchange glances. Marvel shakes his head and looks away.

Thresh is the first to respond. _'I'm with her. I don't want to live like this either.'_

Wow, I didn't think he'd support me. He did kill me, after all.

Sierra nods. _'I'm in, too. That was my plan anyway.'_

' _I'm in.'_ Rue says. She looks so tiny and so young, even as a mutt, but she holds her head up bravely. _'This isn't how it's supposed to be. They shouldn't have made us like this. They have to pay.'_

I nod. _'We know there's rebellion going on out there. I think it's time to bring it in here.'_

One by one the others agree, joining me in my suicide mission. Some appear to ponder for a time, but they mostly agree that this is no kind of life. Only Marvel and the two from District Nine stick to the idea of escaping alive, but they all say they'll stick with us for a while, until they find a way.

' _We still have one problem.'_ the boy from Four tells us. _'We still don't know where to go.'_

Again, it's Rue who pipes up with the solution. _'I do. Whatever they did to us that made us telepathic, they did something more to me. I can read some of their minds. I saw the blueprint.'_

She looks up at the guards and, as she said earlier, they all turn away towards a small window that opens into the building as a tray of coffee cups appears on a conveyor belt. Rue gives a rough imitation of a grin and begins to scratch lines in the earth. We have wrists like humans, and she simply uses her longest claw to draw out the design of the entire place, showing every lab, every staff room. It shows hundreds of hidden areas that no-one would find. Even if the rebels won and then got in here and shut these labs down, they'd never find all of those little places. The labs would go on, eventually allowing the Capitol to regain control.

I watch Rue's face as she works intently at the drawing. She's a bright kid. I guess the scientists underestimated the size and power of her brain if she's ended up able to do this. An unfamiliar part of me suddenly thinks that it's a shame she didn't win. I reckon she deserved to. And the rebels could probably win this war in a heartbeat with a mind like that on side. Then again, what would we do if she wasn't here?

When the drawing's complete she points at a little room right in the heart of the mountains, separate from every other part and reachable only through a long tunnel. _'This is the main control room. It holds the power for all of the labs. Destroy this box and the entire lab system will blow. It's a failsafe, to destroy evidence if necessary.'_

That box will soon have my teeth crushing it.

' _There's a back way out.'_ she continues. _'A back-up escape route for the scientists. You could get out that way before it blew, if you were fast.'_

Well, that should please Marvel and the two from Nine. The two and a half minutes are nearly up so we all quickly scrub out the blueprint, appearing to simply roll around in a massive mock fight. We've all memorised it anyway. When the claxon sounds we head back in the door, agreed that we will break out in two days. It will give us time to get our strength up.

As soon as we're back in our cells, and the door has shut behind the scientists, I glance at Marvel and realise that I'm in for a lecture.

' _Save it, Marvel. I'm gonna destroy this place or I'm gonna die trying.'_

' _You're gonna die succeeding, Clove! Is that really what you want?'_

' _For the thousandth time, Marvel, I don't want to live like this! I don't want to spend my life as one of their mutts!'_

' _That's not what this is about Clove - at least not all that it's about. So don't say it is. It's about you not wanting to live without Cato, or with these memories or whatever. I hate the memories of what we did to him, too, Clove. I know it's different, but-'_

I snarl at him. _'You're right. It is different. And it's not the point! This is my choice, Marvel! I choose to use whatever life is left in me to set some things right!'_

' _Do you think Cato would want you to give up on life like this? Do you think he'd want you to kill yourself because he died?'_

' _I think he'd hate this life as much as I do! I think he'd tell me to do what I felt was right! And I knew him better than you, Marvel. You're not from District Two, you couldn't understand! District One might be Careers as well but you'll never understand how much death and glory can mean to us in Two!'_

' _What glory?!'_ If we were speaking aloud that would've been a howl. _'Clove, who is ever going to know about it? There is no glory in this! No-one will know what we did!'_

' _We'll know. I'll know that my family and every pair of star-crossed lovers out there and every child will have a chance of surviving this rebellion and living on! We can give the world a chance to escape from the Capitol forever! You saw those maps, Marvel, even if the rebels break in here they'll never find all of it! This is the one thing I can do to set right a lot of things that I helped to make wrong.'_

That's a true part of it. I'm ashamed now of the lust for glory that was bred into my district. I have, as surely as any other person from Two, fed into the flames of the Hunger Games, helped them spread and continue. I have helped to glorify the Capitol and keep their power going. Now I will set that right. Even though I'm not human any more, maybe I'll find some trace of humanity again in this mission.

' _What do you hope to do, anyway?'_ I challenge him. _'Escape into the wild? Forge a new life? How far do you think anyone would get with these labs still standing? They'd hunt us down and kill us. So you go, you and Nine run. We'll cover your escapes by blowing this place sky high. That way we all get what we want.'_

Marvel shakes his head again and turns away from me. Just before he does I catch a glimpse of something unfamiliar in his eyes, like a shadow of the way Cato used to look at me. I probably imagined it, but it doesn't matter either way. Because he's going to escape and go and carve a new life in the wild, and I am going to die in a last act of atonement and freedom.

* * *

The next couple of days pass quietly. Marvel and I barely speak. Our conversation was so heated that everyone else heard, but no-one else says anything. Plans are perfected and agreed on. The day of the mutt rebellion arrives.

As we come out into the yard the smell of roses hits my nose, so overpowering to my strong mutt-senses that I want to gag. Through the chain link fence, we see a group of lizard-like mutts being herded along towards one of the buildings. They seem to be murmuring "Katniss" in a hiss over and over again. I wouldn't like to be that girl right now. I have to suppress a shudder.

We train as usual, but keep our eyes on the guards. We've split into two groups, eight to take on the guards - me, Thresh, the two from Nine, the two from Seven, the boy from Six and the girl from Four - and the rest to tackle the fence. Sure enough, at the same time as always they all turn away from us towards the conveyor belt carrying their coffee. Sierra immediately leads the fence team through the tunnel to get to work, and as soon as they reach the fence the eight of us attack the guards from behind. They're no match for us, taken by surprise, outnumbered two mutts to one human and unable to get their guns aimed in time. One of them pulls a knife, though, and District Four goes down already dying. She yelps and howls quietly, and then goes limp.

The other seven of us race to the fence as alarms start ringing, sirens wailing throughout the lab system. There's already a hole in the chain link and we dash through just behind the others. Rue has the clearest memory of the blueprint and she leads the way into a rarely used corridor that the guards won't expect us to use. We can't stick to little-used halls for long, though.

We make it a fairly good way before we hit the first problem. Guards, a lot of them, with guns. We swerve away down a corridor, running full pelt as shots ring out behind us. The girl from Eight and the boy from Five fall, and the boys from Four and Ten are both wounded. Those of us who survive the hail of bullets escape into the air vents.

We can't hide there forever though. We have to come out into a corridor again, and it's already crawling with guards. These, however, don't appear to have had time to grab guns. They have tazers and knives, but no-one seems to have a gun. Nonetheless, Marvel swears quietly.

Rue turns to me. _'Do you remember the blueprint, Clove?'_

I nod. _'Yeah, but you're-'_

' _I'm fast.'_ she interrupts. _'I can draw them off and the rest of you can go on to the main control room.'_

' _No!'_ Thresh and I snarl at the same time.

' _No way, Rue. You're coming with us and you're gonna get out of here!'_ I tell her. Is it weird that I become a vicious mutt and suddenly get slightly maternal and protective over young people, when I was happy enough to kill them when I was human?

' _I'm not getting out, Clove. I don't want to live as a mutt, either. I'd be standing in that room when you blew it up anyway. This way I can give you a chance to get there. I can give my family and every pair of star-crossed lovers out there and every child a chance of surviving this rebellion and living on.'_

I knew they were all listening to us!

Thresh shakes his head, still unhappy with it. _'They might catch you and kill you a worse way than an explosion.'_

Rue appears to grin at him as she quotes her interview with Caesar Flickerman from before the Games. _'I'm very hard to catch. And if they can't catch me, they can't kill me.'_

Sierra gives a silent chuckle. _'I'll go with the kid. I'm cunning. I can elude them, keep them running in circles, maybe keep them off of her. Between us, maybe we can keep them running around until you've set off the explosion.'_

I don't like the thought of anyone sacrificing their lives to get me further, but then aren't we all sacrificing our lives? Isn't that what all of us, except Marvel and the two from Nine, agreed on? Neither girl bothers to wait for me to agree. Rue dashes from hiding and barks as she streaks past the guards. I hear their gasps and yells of surprise, and the kid is around the corner before they've had time to draw their weapons. She really is fast. And brave. No wonder she lasted so long in the Games.

Sierra slips out of the vent while the guards are distracted. By the time half of them have disappeared after Rue, Sierra's at the corner, barking and growling at them. The other half, taken by surprise again, take off after her. They're too surprised by the appearance - seemingly from nowhere - of the two that they don't think to split up any more. They all go after Sierra. As soon as they're gone the rest of us race down the corridor. I'm in the lead, at the point, I guess, with Marvel at my right and Thresh at my left. I know exactly where I'm going, but I also know that a dozen cameras are recording us.

And of course, it's not long before the next attack comes.

As we dash down a long corridor which feels more like a tunnel the smell of roses hits us again, and with it half a dozen other smells. Doors open behind us and other mutts pour into the corridor, including the lizard-mutts we saw earlier - guess they didn't send all of them after Katniss - and some fierce-looking monkeys. These mutts are fast and their howling and shrieking is filling the whole corridor. We can't outrun them. We're still too far from the end.

By unspoken agreement six tributes turn and skid to a halt, the pair from Seven - a large, burly couple - and the boys from Three, Four, Six and Ten. The two from Seven literally tailspin and face the oncoming mutts. I don't want to leave them, but our numbers are going down and this is what we agreed on. Everyone decided I would be the one to get to the box, because I have the strongest jaws and the most determination. Everyone will try to get me to the end to finish this.

Thresh, Marvel, the two from Nine and I push ourselves faster as the sounds of battle ring out behind us. They quickly fade away as we retreat deeper and deeper into the heart of the mountains. We're getting closer to our goal. Everything goes very quiet. There are no guards here, no mutts except us. Just five of us left now. We break into the final corridor - a straight fifty-yard dash to the main control room and victory.

The snarl comes from just behind us. We all turn instinctively this time, because it sounds so similar to our own snarls. And there's a reason for that. A tribute-mutt is standing behind us. And my heart rips into pieces for the second time since I became a mutt, because I know those slate-grey eyes. It's Cato.

But it's not, not really. It's his eyes, yes, and that hurts me so much I want to cry, though I can't because they took my tear ducts. But it's not his brain. I can see that it isn't. They were telling the truth on that. His eyes hold none of the spark that the other tributes' do. No intelligence, no understanding. It's not just because they're controlling him. It's because they haven't made him like the rest of us. They've used his eyes and his hair and whatever else, but it isn't really him.

That still doesn't mean that I can fight him, that I can tear him apart again.

Marvel nudges me as the mutt that is NOT Cato advances. ' _Clove, come on, move! It's not him!'_

I shake my head and begin to back off. Cato was fast. Depending on what they've done to make this mutt, it could be faster than any of us. How are we going to outrun it to the end?

Thresh suddenly places himself between us. _'Go.'_ he growls silently, glancing over his shoulder. _'I killed you and I let Katniss go. This time I let you go. I have a score to settle with him, even if it's not really his brain in there. He won't kill me this time.'_

There's no time to worry about leaving him behind. We're all martyrs here. The four of us turn as he advances on the Cato-mutt. We hear them ripping into each other as we dash down the corridor. A keypad at the end is easily overridden with a swipe of Marvel's claws and the doors swing open. Huh. I thought destroying them was supposed to seal the doors closed. Backwards Capitol technology, I guess.

Inside we find Seneca Crane standing in front of a row of computers. He stares at us with wide eyes. "Well, you lot got a long way, but it won't help you. The only way to destroy this entire place is to get to that tiny little box way up there." He points to a little black box near the high ceiling. "You'll never reach it before reinforcements arrive. And even if you escape, we'll hunt you down."

As he speaks he's heading for the way out, edging towards it as though we won't notice 'til the last second, but he's not getting away with that. Marvel and I leap at him, snarling, and rip him to pieces between us. He's dead before he can get out more than one agonised scream. I almost wish we'd had time to take it slower, to make him suffer as much as Cato suffered because of him.

With the taste of his blood in my mouth I look at Marvel over the bloody corpse between us. _'Rumours of Seneca Crane's demise are no longer exaggerated.'_ I tell him.

He gives a strange coughing bark like laughter. The two from Nine look towards an open door that leads out into a valley in the mountains.

' _Go.'_ I tell them. _'And good luck.'_

' _You too.'_ says the girl. _'Hope you succeed.'_

The odds aren't in my favour now. The girl and boy from District Nine turn and dash away up the escape tunnel. I lift my head towards the black box as sounds of pursuit echo from behind. Too close. It's too late. With no-one to watch my back I'll never make it in time. I'm about to despair when I realise Marvel's still here.

' _Marvel, what are you doing? I'm not coming. I'm gonna go down fighting, don't wait for me!'_

' _I'm not. I'm watching your back. I'll hold them off so you can get to the box.'_

' _Marvel, you could get out of here.'_

' _You were right, Clove. This isn't life. Not for me, anyway. I want to be free. I don't want to be a pawn in their games any more. No-one should be. This way we can help everyone, we can make a difference. Change the future. Even if I escape, as long as I live like this I'll always be a pawn in their games. I couldn't tell that 'til now. I won't live like that. We have to put this right. Now.'_

I give him the best semblance of a grin I can manage in this form and nod. I turn and leap onto the top of the computer as a group of guards and mutts come in. As I launch myself three metres up the wall and dig my claws in bullets strike the plaster around me. A few more sing past me as I climb and then screams and snarls tell me Marvel is making short work of them. There are too many for him to fight off for long, though.

I scale the wall as fast as I can, scrambling towards the black box that will give salvation and annihilation. I don't dare glance back at Marvel. I reach the box and clamp my teeth around it. It's tough, but my jaws are tougher, stronger. As soon as I crush it flames erupt through the labs as every piece of technology detonates. I hope District Nine escaped in time.

As the fire rips through my body, my brain grants me a last moment of bliss. For a second I am back in our camp in the arena, curled up in Cato's arms, safe and sound and human.

 _ **Thanks for reading. :)**_


End file.
